Extravagant birthday parties for kids are out-of-control monstrosities of conspicuous spending
Denis Hamill
Tuesday, October 5th 2010, 4:00 AM
There’s nothing happy about birthdays.
I have four kids.
When my brother died five years ago, his son came to live with me. His birthday is in August.
Three of my own kids have birthdays in September. One in October. Which has always left me broke by November. Just in time for Christmas shopping.
Meaning I start every January hip-deep in credit card bills, which I only end up paying off by my birthday in April. Just in time for April 15, income tax day, which is when I send a birthday gift to my Uncle Sam.
All of this has been cause for deep reflection. Obviously, I was enjoying myself a little too much around the holidays when I was a younger swordsman and nine months later, I started picking up life-long tabs for my brief indulgences.
But I’ve paid enough. Most parents pay way too much for their kids’ birthdays.
Start with the ludicrous cost of a kid’s birthday party today.
I don’t know how or when it started, but somewhere along the American road simple birthday parties with an ice cream cake, pointy hats, chips and Pin the Tail on the Donkey have evolved into mini-coronations for spoiled brats.
“Oh, junior has a real biggie coming up this year,” I heard one modern mother say. “He’s gonna be FIVE.”
Okay, I understand the milestone of the Big 5-0.
But when did the Big 0-5 become an Earth-shifting number? For the Big 0-5, parents with too much disposable income pay the equivalent of a month’s rent for a “theme” party with clowns, magicians, petting zoos, merry-go-rounds and professional party planners.
I hate to sound like an old crank, but when I was a kid, six other kids showed up with $2 toys to eat an Ebinger’s cake and sing “Happy Birthday.” Price tag: $20. Today, kids have $1,000 parties in indoor playgrounds where it’s $10 extra per kid if your son’s entire fourth-grade class uses the laser tag room. I’ve been to birthday parties in Adventureland, bowling alleys, indoor swimming pools in winter, batting cages, outdoor swimming pools and movie theaters.
Some of these were for my own kid, all over Queens.
I’ll never forget a Sweet 16 a friend threw for his daughter at the Waldorf-Astoria that cost him more than the down payment on my house.
I attended a bat mitzvah that had open bars, a half-dozen international food stations, a raw bar and a teen malt shop.
I ate until I needed a personal trainer. Then a waiter shouted, “Please be seated for dinner.” And two big doors opened into a massive dining room where a four-course meal was presented with a deejay, a This-Is-Your-Life slide show, and speeches by family, friends and a rabbi.
“This not only cost more than my wedding,” whispered one partygoer. “It cost more than my divorce.”
All for a kid who just turned a whopping 12.
Okay, let’s hit the brakes, grownups.
Birthdays are killing us. The country reels from the second-worst economic collapse in history. Countless millions are unemployed. Foreclosures are rampant. And we’re spending ourselves bankrupt to sing “Happy Birthday” to little ingrates who choose only to remember those times when you say, “No!”
Wanna see this crap stop?
Turn the tables. How about on the date of his or her Earth-shattering birth, a kid of 7 and older has to celebrate the parents who brought him or her into the world instead of the other way around? On their birthdays, kids should shower parents with gifts for giving them the gift of life. If kids don’t have money, then they should clean the dishes, take out the garbage, do the laundry, mow the lawn, shovel the snow and clean their own rooms.
At 14, when they’re old enough for working papers, kids should start buying gifts for their parents.
You, Little Miss Shopaholic, with the skin-tight $200 jeans, break open the piggy bank and go buy mom a dozen white tulips to say thanks for losing her figure giving birth to you 15 years ago today. Then cook her some dinner. And do the dishes. And put the ottoman under her tired feet.
You, Mister Cool Jock, for your 16th birthday, go out and Simonize the old man’s car. Especially if you ever expect him to lend you the keys or co-sign for wheels of your own.
Mother’s Day and Father’s Day aren’t enough. That leaves 363 Kids’ Days a year. If a family has four kids, there should be four more Mother’s and Father’s Days a year, when kids give back to their parents, who pick up the tab for them every day.
Then I’ll start singing “Happy Birthday” again.dhamill@nydailynews.comMY BACKYARD
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/queens/2010/10/05/2010-10-05_bday_blowouts_are_kidtastrophes.html?page=1#ixzz11YpfH4WR
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/queens/2010/10/05/2010-10-05_bday_blowouts_are_kidtastrophes.html#ixzz11Yp7xbwt
